Historicism: Difference between revisions

{{about|philosophical theories known collectively as ''historicism''|the school of historiography|Historism|the school of art and architecture|Historicism (art)|the method of interpreting the Book of Revelation|Historicism (Christianity)|historicism in music|Musical historicism}}

{{cleanup|reason=[[Anthropological historicism]] may deserve a separate page by itself|date=February 2023}}

'''Historicism''' is an approach to [[Explanation|explaining]] the existence of [[Phenomenon|phenomena]], especially social and cultural practices (including ideas and beliefs), by studying the process or history by which they came about. The term is widely used in [[philosophy]], [[anthropology]], and [[sociology]].

The term ''historicism'' (''Historismus'') was coined by German philosopher [[Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel]].<ref>Brian Leiter, Michael Rosen (eds.), ''The Oxford Handbook of Continental Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 2007, p. 175: "[The word 'historicism'] appears as early as the late eighteenth century in the writings of the German romantics, who used it in a neutral sense. In 1797 Friedrich Schlegel used 'historicism' to refer to a philosophy that stresses the importance of history..."; [[Katherine Harloe]], Neville Morley (eds.), ''Thucydides and the Modern World: Reception, Reinterpretation and Influence from the Renaissance to the Present'', Cambridge University Press, 2012, p. 81: "Already in Friedrich Schlegel's ''Fragments about Poetry and Literature'' (a collection of notes attributed to 1797), the word ''Historismus'' occurs five times."</ref> Over time, what historicism is and how it is practiced have developed different and divergent meanings.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Reynolds|first=Andrew|date=1999-10-01|title=What is historicism?|url=https://doi.org/10.1080/02698599908573626|journal=International Studies in the Philosophy of Science|volume=13|issue=3|pages=275–287|doi=10.1080/02698599908573626|issn=0269-8595|url-access=subscription}}</ref> Elements of historicism appear in the writings of French essayist [[Michel de Montaigne]] (1533–1592) and Italian philosopher [[G. B. Vico]] (1668–1744), and became more fully developed with the [[dialectic]] of [[Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel]] (1770–1831), influential in 19th-century Europe. The writings of [[Karl Marx]], influenced by Hegel, also occasionally include historicism. The term is also associated with the empirical social sciences and with the work of [[Franz Boas]]. Historicism tends to be [[hermeneutics|hermeneutic]] because it values cautious, rigorous, and contextualized interpretation of information; or [[relativism|relativist]], because it rejects notions of universal, fundamental and immutable interpretations.<ref>Kahan, Jeffrey. "Historicism." ''Renaissance Quarterly'', vol. 50, no. 4 December 22, 1997, p. 1202</ref>

===Hegelian===

Hegel's historicism also suggests that any human [[society]] and all human activities such as [[science]], [[art]], or [[philosophy]], are defined by their history. Consequently, their essence can be sought only by understanding said history. The history of any such human endeavor, moreover, not only continues but also reacts against what has gone before; this is the source of Hegel's famous dialectic teaching usually summarized by the slogan "[[Thesis, antithesis, synthesis|thesis, antithesis, and synthesis]]". (Hegel did not use these terms, although [[Johann Gottlieb Fichte|Johann Fichte]] did.) Hegel's famous [[aphorism]], "Philosophy is the history of philosophy", describes it bluntly.

These ideas can be interpreted variously. The [[Right Hegelians]], working from Hegel's opinions about the organicism and historically determined nature of human societies, interpreted Hegel's historicism as a justification of the unique destiny of national groups and the importance of stability and institutions. Hegel's conception of human societies as entities greater than the individuals who constitute them influenced nineteenth-century [[romantic nationalism]] and its twentieth-century excesses. The [[Young Hegelians]], by contrast, interpreted Hegel's thoughts on societies influenced by social conflict for a doctrine of [[social progress]], and attempted to manipulate these forces to cause various results. Karl Marx's doctrine of "historical inevitabilities" and [[historical materialism]] is one of the more influential reactions to this part of Hegel's thought. Significantly, Karl Marx's [[Marx's theory of alienation|theory of alienation]] argues that [[capitalism]] disrupts traditional relationships between workers and their work.

In ''The Open Society and Its Enemies'', Popper attacks "historicism" and its proponents, among whom  he identifies and singles out Hegel, [[Plato]] and [[Marx]]—calling them all "enemies of the open society".  The objection he makes is that historicist positions, by claiming that there is an inevitable and deterministic pattern to history, evade the responsibility of the individual to make free contributions to the evolution of society, hence leading to [[totalitarianism]]. Throughout this work, he defines his conception of historicism as: "The central historicist doctrine—the doctrine that history is controlled by specific historical or evolutionary laws whose discovery would enable us to prophesy the destiny of man."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Popper |first=Karl |url=https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv15r5748.10 |title=The Open Society and its Enemies |publisher=[[Princeton University Press]] |year=2020 |volume=119 |pages=161–89 |doi=10.2307/j.ctv15r5748.10 |s2cid=243169961 |url-access=registration}}</ref> As mentioned above, such characterizations of Marx in particular are not entirely accurate to Marx in his own right, and have drawn criticism from philosophers such as [[Imre Lakatos|Lakatos]] for mischaracterizing the defense of induction in [[historical materialism]].<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Burawoy |first=Michael |date=1990 |title=Marxism As Science: Historical Challenges and Theoretical Growth |journal=American Sociological Review |volume=55 |pages=775–93}}</ref> Other philosophers such as [[Walter Kaufmann (philosopher)|Walter Kaufmann]] have also been critical of Popper, calling his reading of Hegel a “myth,”  “known largely through secondary sources…”<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Hegel Myth and Its Method by Walter Kaufmann |url=https://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/us/kaufmann.htm |access-date=2024-10-30 |website=www.marxists.org}}</ref>